The Hunter
by Jax Malcolm
Summary: Egotism, as Scyther learns, can be just as deadly as his prey.


The sunlight struck each blade of brown grass across the preserve that summer day. Overhead, the sky was clear and pale blue. Nothing hindered the sun's heat on its path to the grass except the rare tree desperately clinging to the moisture of the earth. A dry wind blew across the plains.

Against the dry grass, Scyther's exoskeleton was obvious. The mantis raised his head above the swaying sea of brown as he scanned the territory for potential prey. At first, nothing stirred but the grass in the wind. His eyes squinted as he crouched in the grass again with his blades extending in front of him. His legs pushed him forward as his eyes glared straight ahead.

Several yards away, his left scythe grazed something that immediately moved and launched into the air. Scyther swung his gaze upward to see the flap of a pair of pale purple wings. The other insect stared at him with large, glassy eyes. It was waiting.

Scyther recalled the elders' words – the familiar ones he had heard before he had left to hunt for the swarm.

"Use your speed," they had said. "Your prey must not be able to see you strike."

With a nod, Scyther crouched low to the ground. The muscles in his legs tensed as they prepared for the strike. A screech tore from his throat as he leapt into the air with his blades before him. The air sang as metal and exoskeleton sliced through the wind and into the body of Scyther's prey. It screeched as it lost altitude for a brief moment while Scyther landed behind it, but it never touched the ground. Instead, it turned and glared at the hunter before flapping its wings vigorously to shake a fine, golden powder from each scale.

The sight of the dust conjured the second piece of advice Scyther's elders had given him.

"Purple ones," they had said, "have three moves you must beware. The first is the cloud of gold. If you touch it, then it will curse your body. Your body will refuse to move, and you will have no other choice but to lay on the earth to die."

Scyther dove to the right to dodge the stream of dust. He drove one of his arms into the hard earth to steady himself when he landed. Cautiously, he turned his head to see his prey and the cloud, the latter of which drifted downward until it coated the grass with a fine, golden shine.

The mantis snorted. He knew the moth's defense had just failed, leaving it wide open for a second attack. Before his prey could move, Scyther launched himself into the air and drove his blades across the midsection of the moth the way he had done just moments ago. The moth screeched as green blood trickled down its cracked exoskeleton and dripped onto the ground below it. Glassy eyes turned to lock onto Scyther as the moth's large, purple wings moved once more. This time, a shower of blue dust rained from its scaled wings.

"The second is the rain of blue," Scyther's elders had told him. "If you touch it, then weariness will overwhelm you. Even if you resist, you will fall asleep before the enemy, and he will take that advantage to strike."

Scyther went left this time. The blue dust drifted onto a new patch of grass, and each blade sparkled like sapphires. At that point, Scyther rose to his feet and eyed his opponent. So far, the moth had landed no hit on Scyther, and Scyther had managed to wound his prey. His mind quickly guessed that one more strike would end the moth's life, so the mantis readied himself for another jump. His legs pushed him off the ground, and he sailed cleanly through the air with a blade outstretched. A loud crunch pierced the quiet of the plains, followed soon after by a squeal. Seconds later, Scyther landed and examined the green blood coating his blade. A smirk crossed his face as he listened carefully for the final thump of his prey falling onto the earth.

It never came. In his curiosity, Scyther turned to find the moth suspended in air, despite the large gash across its abdomen and the pool of green blood forming beneath it. Scyther watched in horror as the moth flapped its great wings one last time, this time to release a billowing cloud of purple dust.

"The third and most fearsome is the purple fog," the elders had said. "It's dangerous. Yes, it is. It burns. It kills. Breathe it, and you will surely die."

He inhaled.

Bitter powder flooded his lungs. Scyther coughed and staggered, but he couldn't get away from the purple powder that coated his body, the ground around him, and everything inside him. His innards burned. His exoskeleton burned. Everything that he was burned with a purple fire of poison. He turned to glare at the moth, but it flitted away in a drunken path as its green blood – surely as poisonous as the moth itself – rained upon the dry grass.

Scyther was alone. His eyes looked towards the blue sky as he staggered towards no particular destination. The poison was working its way into his bloodstream, and he knew it was only a matter of time before he would no longer be of that world. Defeated, he dragged himself to the patch of blue and dropped onto his stomach. His nostrils desperately tried to inhale the blue dust to make his death painless, though he knew the pain from the poison eating away at his insides would deny him of the comfort of sleep.

Nevertheless, he closed his eyes and prayed to his gods. When the sun would set later that day, Scyther would have already departed.


End file.
